It's a New Year

Welcome to 2005! The last year was pretty good for me, especially because it closed with Kate agreeing to marry me! ;-) Here's hoping that 2005 has it's fair share of good times as well.

Interesting that I've already managed to forget to post on my blog after only having it for a month or so. Pff. Oh, well.

The holidays were great...very relaxing. The day of our flight to Washington was a little off. Kate and I were running late heading down from Fort Collins and the cold and ice on I-25 wasn't helping matters much. On the north side of Denver, I hit a patch of "black ice" and slid off the road! Our angels were working overtime thankfully, and I managed to keep the Explorer under control enough that we only steered into the ditch between lanes. I didn't hit anyone and the car was still upright. A little work while in 4WD and we made it out of the slippery slope.

Next we braved thoroughly indecent lines at DIA and ended up missing our flight. They had started calling forward folks that hadn't missed the 45-minute cut-off for checking bagagge; if they had started doing that maybe fifteen minutes earlier, we might have made the flight. Oh, well, I couldn't hardly blame the DIA employees; they were really looking frazzled and were obviously trying to do their best to get as many people to their flights as possible. I was rather disturbed at how many of my fellow travelers were downright hostile to this poor airport workers. It made me thankful for the job that I have; after all, I could be working the airport!

We managed to get transferred to a connecting flight on Delta (rather than United) that evening at 8pm (since we missed our 11:45am flight). Kate, Emily, and I spent long hours in lines and just sitting...so much so that by the time we boarded the plane, I was too tired to be anxious about flying! ;-) Oh, on that note, I'd like to say that the flight from Denver to Salt Lake City and connecting flight to Pasco, WA, was the smoothest I'd ever had! Thanks to the nice people from Delta!

Did I mention the three of us also got tagged for "special" screening while going through security at DIA? That was interesting. I guess I must've looked pretty shady to them with my darkish skin tone and two attractive women at my elbows. ;-) Curious thing: the x-ray and hand inspection of Kate's luggage didn't turn up the full-size scissors and nail clippers that she forgot were still in her carry-on. Oops!

I spent my time in Selah, WA, either reading, sleeping in, or watching Kate's brother Daniel play video games. I'm afraid to admit it, but I have been beaten at Soul Caliber II by a 12 year old. Oh, the shame! Otherwise, the whole trip was quick but very relaxing. I finished three of the books I was trying to finish and got caught up on my sleep. Many thanks to the O'Connells for being so welcoming.

We flew back to Denver, said goodbye to Emily (and her fiance Jason), and drove down to Colorado Springs. We had a little bit of a concern because Kate and I forgot to note down where the Explorer was parked in the paid-parking lot. But angels were with us again and we stumbled into it within five minutes. We got in late to my sister's place and chatted for just a little while before crashing. We spent the next day just hanging out and headed back up to Fort Collins late that night.

Originally, we were going to stay through the morning of New Year's Eve...but since I had a party to prep for, we decided to head back a little earlier. The party was a smashing success, of course. Bill, Tammy, Ron, Dawn, Kate, and myself managed to stay up past midnight and ring in the New Year. We did miss seeing good old Dick Clark on the TV but hopefully we'll see in for 2006. Arne, Jennie, and Liam stopped by for a little while. We played a number of board and card games and drank WAY too much soda and cider. Bill and I stayed up an extra two hours to play Halo 2...and we're pretty sure we're done with XBox games for a little while. ;-)

Kate and I spent the next couple days doing absolutely nothing and then it was back to work!

And that's how I spent my Christmas holiday! :-)